


two birds on a wire.

by commonemergency



Category: Dan Howell - Fandom, Phan, Phil Lester - Fandom, dan and phil, dan howell/phil lester - Fandom
Genre: Anxiety, Depression, Existential Crisis, Hurt/Comfort, Love, M/M, Unrequited Love, identity crisis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-12
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-08-08 07:12:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7748131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/commonemergency/pseuds/commonemergency
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan Howell is angry and tired and mad at the world. This is a story about two boys who try to figure out what they are again after a year of loss and heartbreak, and learning to love themselves again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	two birds on a wire.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a 2011-2012 story that mainly focuses on what Dan might have been going through during that time. There's some slight gay slurs but nothing too bad. There's a lot of questioning on life and a lot of anger and hurt. Though I promise that there's a resolved ending. I mean, have we seen 2016 Dan? It's beautiful, friends. I've been going through a lot mentally and the best way I vent is through writing which inspired this angsty (but in the end I like to think sweet ending) story. Named after Two Birds by Regina Spektor which helped fuel this fic.

**i.**

Dan doesn’t feel real. At least, sometimes, when it’s late at night and he’s laying in bed and thinking about all the things that he did wrong- or all the things that he said that he knows would cause some sort of problem. Or the invisible wounds that he’s caused because he’s just too afraid. 

He’s trying hard to find some sort of anchor to hold him down to reality, but his cheeks and his ears are heating up, and the room is spinning slightly and if he tried to get up now he doesn’t think he’d be able too. The feeling reminds him of that one time he got high, about a year ago, he was at a house party, and he was drunk enough to do it. Though, he didn’t quite understand that there were different kinds of weed, and this one effected the body. He had crawled up the stairs, desperately trying to find something soft to lay on, and when he did he kept on thinking of how he was going to die, and that he was paralyzed because he couldn’t move his body. It was too much for him, and that’s exactly what he’s feeling again now. He can’t move or get up, if he does he’s afraid he’ll fall. 

When he gets like this he has to wait it out until the next day, and then he feels shitty about it. Phil doesn’t ask if he’s okay anymore, because each time he tries to see how Dan is feeling he’ll shake him off and tell him that he’s fine, he doesn’t need his help right now, and he’d ask if he did. _Mind your own business, Lester._

He’s scared of himself when he’s in one of his moods. It’s like he becomes someone that’s unrecognizable. It’s been him this entire year. He’s decided that even though it hasn’t been 2012 for very long- he doesn’t necessarily like it and would like if it ended already. Because the days drag, and there’s too much going on for him to really appropriately react to it, and everything feels like a chore; eating, breathing, talking, walking, living. He doesn’t want to do any of it. 

If ever there was a moment in Dan’s life that he didn’t want to exist, it would be now. 

**ii.**

When Dan was a kid, there were only a few instances where he wanted to runaway. And never come back. After a bad fight with his parents about his grades, how he couldn’t seem to shut up and listen to the teacher, he felt offended by it- that his parents weren’t proud of him trying. They didn’t care to listen to that fact, but instead took things away from him in punishment. That night he packed his bags, and he _swore_ he was leaving this place. He wouldn’t be back, his parents would just have to deal with having only one son, and he’d bet that they’d like that anyway. His other brother was probably a _much_ better match for them than him. 

Technically, his first best friend was named David, and they did everything together, well, almost everything together. Dan just wanted to be around him all the time. Because that’s what it was like in this movies, when you’re best friends with someone you’re around them a lot and they can’t get sick of you, _because_ you’re best friends. That wasn’t the case for Dan. 

For a couple of months the little duo were always near each other. Dan can still remember the fact that: Dave hated fish & chips, and the he wrote an essay on why it should stop being the stereotypical staple of England. Dave was allergic to pumpkin, and Dan was there first hand to find that out because they both shared a slice of pumpkin pie together. And then Dave that night had to go to the hospital because of an allergic reaction. Dan sat in the waiting room worried out of his mind because this was his _first_ best friend, he couldn’t just die. Even though Dan knew that his best friend dying was a little bit dramatic- he couldn’t help but be anxious, because that’s all he ever was. He remembered that his favourite season was fall, and that he loved the band New Radicals because they played one song in a soundtrack that he liked. 

Dan was happy, because for a while he was needed in someone’s life. For a while he mattered deeply to someone. He was a priority to somebody and that was something that he never felt before. Because for so long he never had a friend that he was close with, he never had someone he could tell things too. He never had that sense of belonging with anyone before and having Dave was a friend- he felt honoured. 

And then one day, things changed. It was like it happened over night. The things Dan did for Dave were unappreciated. He would often get him things that he knew that Dave would like, and Dave would brush it off saying that he didn’t like it anymore or his interest was lost. Their hangouts were slim to eventually none. When they saw each other at school Dan got the point across that Dave didn’t want him around him anymore. And whenever Dan would text him if they were okay, or if there was something he did wrong he wouldn’t get an answer. A year of friendship and it disintegrated and it left Dan feeling like that anything he ever did for anyone would never be good enough. Because people always preferred other people. 

When things officially ended with David, Dan for the second time in his life had the urge to runaway. Because instead of facing those problems that he faced he wanted to go as far away from them, because then he didn’t have to deal with it and feel what he was feeling, because admitting that he wasn’t likable was far more scary than just facing it head on. He didn’t cry about it, because being fourteen year old boy- you’re not allowed to cry about your problems, not only was it socially acceptable for boys to cry about things- but it showed weakness. So he buried it, and he was miserable for so long that he was stuck in the same rut that he finds himself seven years later. 

He never wanted to die. He just didn’t really want to live either. 

**iii.**

It gets to be too much for Phil sometimes, Dan knows that. He’s always been self-aware of things but, _goddamnit_ , he doesn’t fucking care anymore. 

He’s tired. 

He’s so goddamn tired he can’t care about anyone else right now other than himself, because he’s too busy drowning than to give a fuck about anyone else. And he knows that’s selfish. He knows that half the time when it comes to Phil he’s coming off as a dick but sometimes? Sometimes he just hates Phil. 

He hates his existence. He sometimes wishes that he’s never met him because the fact that someone cares about him so much makes him mad. And he knows that it doesn’t make sense to anyone, the fact that he can hate someone who loves him so much, but he does. He hates Phillip Michael Lester, and he hates that he knows everything about Dan. Even the parts that Dan hates about himself he knows that he loves. He hates it. He fucking hates it. Because he doesn’t want someone to care for him. He doesn’t want Phil to worry about him. He doesn’t want him near him because the fact of someone being selfless with Dan scares the shit out of him.

The truth is this, Dan doesn’t know what being in love is like. Because he might have felt it once but it was painful, and it hurt too much, and the fact that Phil’s hand fits perfectly in his, or the fact that Phil knows how to make him laugh or smile just by saying some stupid thing they said over Skype a few years ago irritates him. He can’t use what they used to have and hang it over him like a knife because that’s what it feels like. 

Eventually, Dan hopes, he pisses Phil off to a point where he leaves him. Because that’ll be so much easier than walking away from him. If he walks away from it, not only does it prove that he’s given up on everything else but given up on the person that he’s ever loved the most. 

2012 is not a good year. And he wants it to end. 

Whenever Dan and Phil fight it’s not loud, things are not thrown, sometimes when they fight it’s quiet, and sometimes that proves to be the most violent. Because when it’s quiet there are things that go unsaid, but the looks that they give each other can say enough. 

But when it really gets bad, Dan can say a lot of hurtful things, he knows what he’s capable of. And he’s said some things that he’ll never be able to take back because he knows that whenever Phil thinks about it, he’ll think about what Dan said and it’ll be forever ingrained in him. Dan likes to think that maybe someday they’d be able to resolve their issues, that maybe someday they could be together, but the thought of it makes him mad, because he doesn’t want to be with Phil. He doesn’t even want to be in his own body much less Phil. And he’ll regret those thoughts when he’s not drunk of the anger that he’s feeling but the anger is all he’s been feeling lately, and the fact that there’s so many people that follow him and Phil’s life doesn’t make it any better. He’s constantly under a looking glass, and people will call him out if he even breathes, so he’s learned that he won’t be able to make a lot of people happy, he can’t make himself happy, and if he’s going to be an asshole then he’ll be the biggest you’ve ever seen because he doesn’t halfass anything. 

It’s too much for him. 

Each time someone mentions Phil in the comments, in tweets, on tumblr, a part of him hardens, that protective glass that they used to have around them shattered a long time ago. They used to be so special and sacred, now it’s been torn apart and never to be seen again. He drowns each time it’s happened, and he’s forgotten how to breathe. 

**iv.**

“You’re suffocating me, Phil,” he says it during an argument. Phil had gotten too close to trying to talk to Dan about what they were doing, both in their private lives and their Internet lives. People were noticing how things changed between the two no matter how hard they tried to work through it. Dan couldn’t be bothered to have the argument over again- the same argument that they’ve been having for months now. 

“How am I suffocating you if you won’t even let me go near you?” Phil quietly says, hands in his pockets, he’s looking down trying to see if he could think hard enough for him to be a mouse he might actually become one, that way he could run off unseen. He’s given his heart to Dan who just won’t fucking open up, no matter how many times he’s tried and Dan knows it, because he sees it, but he can’t let him in. He just can’t. 

“I want you to stop trying, okay? I need you to stop trying so goddamn hard all the time. It’s tiring and pathetic.” This is the last thing Dan says before he rolls his eyes and goes back to his room, slamming the door shut so Phil knows that this is the end of the conversation. 

Boiling hot tears brim as he lays himself in bed but he wants to destroy something, instead he internalizes it. Everywhere he goes in this house, on the internet is a constant reminder of Phil and he needs to get rid of him. He needs to let him go because Phil is a _virus_ , that keeps finding its way back in his life and he hates him. He goddamn hates him. 

Each time Dan opens his mouth around Phil he hurts him. Each word he says is like a dagger, and it’s been in his chest a while and each time they try to rehash it, each time they talk to each other, it’s like the dagger keeps getting deeper and deeper in Phil’s chest, and Dan wants to save him from it. He really does, because deep down even Dan knows that Phil doesn’t deserve it. Because Dan is barely in his twenties and he doesn’t know what he wants from life, and he doesn’t know how to love Phil properly because he wasn’t taught how. The only thing he knew from love was from TV shows and books, but none of the books or the TV show’s he’s watched has ever shown a happy ending; someone always dies, people always break up, or they always pick someone else in the end. 

Dan was just a boy who loved another boy but the world wouldn’t let him. 

And Phil was just a boy who loved another boy but the boy wouldn’t let him. 

They were constantly being attacked by things that kept on separating them. Dan was plagued constantly for being “gay" he was left crude comments anonymously online everywhere he went. He couldn’t post something without someone telling him that he was a “faggot” or that he was this or that, and even though his persona online was that he was too high above these things, or that he didn’t care, it was quite the opposite for Dan because he cared too much of what people thought. As someone who was never told that someone believed in him, he had to try and believe in himself, he had to find his people, but even his people would make comments on his life and his sexuality. And over the numerous liveshows he did, he once said, _“what would it matter to you?”_ when it came to his sexuality, and he still stood by that. But he lived in a world where it mattered and he wished that it didn’t. 

Dan knows that he can say that he hates Phil all he wants, but at night, when he’s put his laptop and phone away and he’s staring at his ceiling, he knows that Phil was the first person in Dan’s life that actually meant something to him. Because he knew him better than he knew himself. He knew his fears, he knew that no matter what he did he couldn’t seem to catch a break. He knew why he says all these mean and nasty things to him, and he knows that it doesn’t make it okay, but he understands it. It makes Dan think even more that he doesn’t deserve Phil because of all of these things that he understands. But they are forever intertwined in each others lives and Dan has to make something work if they’re ever going to try and get better. But he just doesn’t know when that time will come or if it’ll ever come. 

The truth is, Dan loves Phil. He’s always had and he knows that he always will. That’s what happens with Dan. Once you’re in his life you’re there for good and there’s no way to escape it. Even if someone inevitably better will come into Phil’s life he knows that even if he does leave, he’ll still always love Phil. Because there are things that Phil has taught Dan and is still teaching him, even if Phil thinks that he isn’t listening. 

**v.**

Being an adult is scary and it’s painful. Dan was never really prepared for it yet he was forced into it because he had to be. He so badly wanted to leave his hometown that brought a lot of suffering and bad memories, only for Manchester to be a mix of both, when they moved to London it was a fresh start for the both of them. They were still not very close and barely talking to each other, but London felt like it could be the start of something.... just, _new._  
It didn’t cure Dan. Though it helped in the way where he had a new wall to stare at. Moving to London was an experience that he didn’t think he’d ever get, but they had so many good things that were coming up now he knew that he should be happy, but the most important part of Dan was Phil and it still wasn’t okay. 

Though, over time, it was slow. He was trying his best to be someone that somebody could be proud of one day. The harsh words came less and less, over time Dan and Phil started talking again, and Dan was slowly starting to realise that the world won’t change their mind over night, and neither will he, but he has to start somewhere. 

Sometimes he looked at Phil, and he would understand that;

_This is me trying._

_This is me putting myself out there._

_I’m sorry I broke your heart._

_I’m sorry I broke it again, and again, and again._

_I just need time._

**vi.**

So that’s what Phil gave Dan. Time. 

“---Forgive yourself first. Others will, too, eventually. You’ll see,” It’s a line that Phil said, and it’s stuck with him, whenever he thinks about it, it gets him thinking. The boy that was always angry, and hurt, who said so many awful things was given a small second chance at life again and it was his duty to live it. It’s what he’s told so many of his subscribers, if they wanted to improve their life, they needed to try. Though each time he preached some philosophy he often went back and thought, what did he know? he was just a college dropout. He’d never amount to anything. Why do people listen to him anyway? What’s the goddamn point? 

When 2013 came it was a year of discovering who Dan Howell was again. He was still lost but he was on his way to being who needed to be for people. Dan doesn’t talk about what happened in 2012 to Phil very often. It’s a sore subject for both, but they’re learning how to be each other’s friend again. And for the first time in months Dan actually laughs at something that Phil has said in a video and doesn’t even think too much about the repercussions of that. Because Dan Howell should be allowed to laugh at something his best friend said without it being taken out of context. He should be allowed to love his best friend in a platonic way without it being blown proportion. It’s slow, and Dan takes two steps back, sometimes five, when it begins to be too much, but he’s learning to let go and to forgive himself for past mistakes. 

It’s not until the end of 2013 that Dan says it. 

“I’m sorry.” He says it over a movie they’re watching. He’s actually sitting next to Phil this time, they’re both eating popcorn and laughing at whatever is playing on the screen. When Phil looks at him he doesn’t smile, he doesn’t even really react to it for a while. He doesn’t even know what to say to it. Because when it came to Dan and Phil, they both hurt each other. They had big hurdles they had to jump over to get where they were now, and all Phil does is grab Dan’s hand and holds it for a second, before he lets go and turns his head to laugh at another funny moment. 

Because it’s not an “I forgive you”, it’s as close to what he can get to one. Because someday, Phil will forgive Dan. Now he just needs time. Because no friendship is built up over night. But they both know that no matter what- they’ll always love each other. They’ll always support each other. No matter what life throws at them they can handle it together. Because they wouldn’t have both decided to move to London otherwise. 

Because even though they’ve only been here for a year, it hasn’t quite felt like home yet. Though now, as they’re sitting on this couch, there’s something different in the air; there’s no malice, or heartbreak. There’s no unkind words or secret glances of hurt and betrayal. There’s no grudges or things dangling over their heads. With that single touch of the hand, and those two words being uttered, London finally feels like home. 

Because a home is made up of two people or more people- it’s not a roof above your head or the materialistic things lying around the house. It’s the person right next to you that makes you feel something. And Dan and Phil made each other feel everything. Because a house is just a building. But home- it’s a feeling. 

As Dan looks back on the screen, he nods his head to himself in contentment. 

He finally felt like he was coming home.

**Author's Note:**

> If you read all of this, I applaud you and thank you so much. Comments/Kudos are appreciated!


End file.
